Tracy: I was talking about my first "real job" after I got out of college, this was over 11 1/2 years ago. I didn't mean to put a burr in your saddle with my post. The want ad read "We need CRT operators, $5.00 an hour base". Yes, I did know what that was after I talked to the marketing manager, but I decided to give it a go anyway. After all, anything looked better than minimum wage which at the time was $3.35/hr. Plus when you're a greedy capitalist in your early 20s, you're impatiently eager to get your life started pronto (beginning with an apartment of your own). The computerized phone lists contained phone numbers of small business owners nationwide. That was our target group. But the lists were unfortunately not updated often enough, and occasionally we got a private residence. That's what happened when I got ahold of that irate guy. The business owners got impatient with us on occasion and would tell us not to call again (But the computer did receiving and dialing of the numbers), and some of the residents we got by mistake would snap at us. Seriously those people did NOT upset me, and I understood I was the intruder. That's why I searched for, and before long, hired onto a computer operations job; the telemarketing was only to get me started on better than minimum wage and my foot in the door.
Although I do wish businesses would pursue better ways to advertise their products, I don't give telemarketers who call me any grief. They are young people just starting out, and many are divorced moms doing what they have to to support their kids.
And what I was telling the McD's employee who started this message tree is that you will on occasion encounter a hostile customer, and to not let it get to him, possibly to the point where he gives crappy service to everyone, regardless of their temperament, to just get over it, and carry on. It appears that a lot of fast food employees are pissed because they find the working world is not perfect, and not everything is going to go their way. It also seems that a lot of them bitch about their managers because they have an attitude when it comes to authority. They seem to want to run the place themselves, and do the tasks at their convenience, and fuck the customers and management. Not that I'm denying that bad bosses and disruptive, excessively belligerent customers exist.
So take it easy, Tracy! Believe it or not, there are worse things in this world than me! And I didn't mean to get you fired up with my post. Cheers! Mike.
